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Sunday, October 5, 2008

Truck Mounted Infantry




























This is a WWII era German Motorized Infantry Battalion. It is mostly Roco Minitanks, Wiking and a few others, generally in 1/87 HO scale. Each squad gets a truck, an Opel Blitz. These vehicle mounted units are very fast, particularly in Western Europe with a good road network, but vulnerable to attack by aircraft.























The German Panzer Divisions had one or two Armored Infantry Battalions with an additional two to five Motorized Infantry Battalions. Having truck mounted battalions is essential to make a balanced WWII German Army. These troops would not fight from the trucks, but would use the vehicles to transport them near the enemy and they could then dismount and fight on foot. Care would have to be taken to insure the truck would not be subject to artillery fire, but still be close enough to remount the infantry so they could continue the attack or withdraw.





















Kubelwagens, German "Jeeps" and motorcycles were used in large numbers as HQ vehicles and for carrying messages and recon activities. Truck mounted infantry were capable troops who could move rapidly and show up where the enemy did not expect them to be. They are very useful on the wargame table.

2 comments:

Snickering Corpses said...

I could have thought I had a lot of trucks, before seeing this :>

What's the total count of each vehicle type for that?

Mike Bunkermeister Creek said...

2 Roco 4.5 t Mercedes trucks

1 crane mounted on a SdKfz 7halftrack

3 VW Bug

1 Van trailer

6 Opel Blitz vans, Wiking

5 Opel Blitz tanker trucks, Wiking

2 Staff cars

25 BMW with sidecars, Roco

39 Kubelwagen, Roco

4 Opel Blitz cargo trucks, Wiking

63 Opel Blitz cargo trucks, Roco

Thats more or less a full motorized infantry battalion. I need to do some sorting for the final version.